Buyout firm to pay $78 a share for QTS, companies say

Blackstone Group Inc. has struck a roughly $6.7 billion deal to buy QTS Realty Trust Inc. and take the data-center operator private.

The investment giant’s infrastructure unit, Blackstone Infrastructure Partners, together with its nontraded real-estate investment trust, known as BREIT, have agreed to pay $78 a share for QTS, the companies plan to announce Monday. The price represents a 21% premium to QTS’s closing share price Friday and a 24% premium to the volume-weighted average over the last 90 days.

Investment firm Blackstone Group Inc (BX.N) will buy data center operator QTS Realty Trust Inc (QTS.N) for about $6.7 billion, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday.

The buyout firm’s infrastructure unit along with its non-traded real-estate investment trust will pay $78 per share for QTS, according to the report.(https://bit.ly/3ioXRxx)

The price represents a premium of about 21% to QTS’ closing price on Friday.

A COVID-19 pandemic-led remote working environment boosted demand for cloud services, which are reliant on data centers. QTS has more than 7 million square feet of data center space throughout North America and Europe.

The transaction is valued at about $10 billion, including the assumption of the data center operator’s existing debt, the report said.

Blackstone and QTS did not immediately respond to Reuters’ request for comment.

https://www.reuters.com/business/blackstone-buy-qts-realty-trust-67-bln-wsj-2021-06-07/